1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to storage of voice mail messages and, more particularly, to the transfer of voice mail messages from conventional storage to removable media, such as cassette tapes, compact discs, mini-discs, or any other conventional medium to be used with readily-available consumer audio equipment.
2. Description of the Related Art
There are a number of telephone communication systems available offering information services to users. Many of these systems store and forward voice mail messages. Examples of such systems are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,371,752; 4,580,012; 4,581,486; 4,585,906; and 4,602,129, all assigned to VMX, Inc. (U.S. Pat. No. 4,371,752 was originally assigned to ECS Telecommunications, Inc.). Other systems are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,029,199 and 5,193,110 both of which are assigned to Boston Technology, Inc. and are incorporated herein by reference. These systems are connected to a central office of a local telephone company or to a private branch exchange or other system handling calls for a large number of telephones. When one of the telephones serviced by the central office or other system is not answered, the calling party is given an opportunity to leave a telephone message which is stored for later reproduction by the user of the called telephone, i.e., the voice message mailbox owner.
A user of a typical voice mail system has several options in handling voice mail messages. After a message has been retrieved, the message may be deleted, saved or forwarded to another mailbox. A user may wish to save important messages for a long period of time. However, saving voice mail messages in a mailbox for a long period of time is inefficient. Every time a user requests a list of messages in the mailbox, older messages will be listed, even though the user will usually only be interested in recent messages. One way of avoiding this situation on existing systems would be to set up one or more voice message mailboxes for the purpose of storing archive messages. Drawbacks to this solution include the chance of losing data over a long period of time; monopolization of system resources; limiting the amount of memory available for new messages; limiting reproduction of the messages to telephones; increasing the cost of storage; and decreasing overall system efficiency.
An object of the present invention is to provide copies of voice mail messages on removable media, so that the messages may be played back on equipment other than the type of voice mail equipment on which they were recorded.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a system for archiving voice mail messages for multiple voice mail systems.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a voice mail archival system which permits users to select a specific medium from a plurality of media for storage of a voice mail message, where each of the media may have different cost and performance characteristics.
The above objects are attained by providing a method of producing archival recordings of voice mail messages, comprising the steps of: retrieving a voice mail message; transferring the voice mail message to a recording device; and recording the voice mail message on a removable storage medium. In the preferred embodiment, information on how the voice mail message should be recorded is obtained either directly from the user or from a previously stored profile created by the user. The removable storage medium is preferably accessed by the separate archival system, connected via telecommunication lines with one or more voice mail systems. Additionally, the archival system itself may be capable of performing voice mail operations as well as archival operations.
A user identifies one or more voice mail messages to be archived and the message(s) are entered in a queue for transfer from the voice mail system to the archival system. At a predetermined point in time, such as in the middle of the night during low usage of the voice mail system, the voice mail messages are transferred to a queue on the archival system. Subsequently, the archival system instructs the mounting of appropriate storage media for recording of the voice mail messages. The voice mail system receives confirmation of successful transfer of the voice mail messages to the archival system and also receives an indication of successful recording of the voice mail messages. The messages stored on the voice mail system may be either automatically deleted in response to either of these indications, or deletion of the original voice mail messages may be left in the hands of the users, with or without receipt of either of these indications.
In an alternative embodiment of the invention, the archival system is connected to one or more voice mail systems, and the archival system automatically queries the voice mail systems periodically to delete or reproduce messages. According to the alternative embodiment, preferably, all of a user""s messages stored at the voice mail system may be reproduced or deleted automatically by the archival system. However, if the archival system has voice recognition capabilities, the archival system may selectively delete or reproduce messages based upon predefined criteria, such as age of messages, whereby the predefined criteria are recognized by listening to a message using the voice recognition capabilities. In accordance with the alternative embodiment, the archival system may efficiently create a record on a removable storage medium for each user on, e.g., a monthly, quarterly, or yearly basis.
These objects, together with other objects and advantages which will be subsequently apparent, reside in the details of construction and operation as more fully hereinafter described and claimed, reference being had to the accompanying drawings forming a part hereof, wherein like reference numerals refer to like parts throughout.